Camera Lens Hoods – Explained
Camera lens hoods in photography might seem a simple thing, but they can be very confusing for the beginner photographer. Do you need one? What lens hood should you buy for your lens? What are lens hoods for? Why use a lens hood? When do you use one? These are just some of the questions we get asked. So here, I’m going to answer all these questions for you to make sure you get the best results in your photography and are using the correct one for your lens.
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Why use a camera lens hood?
The main reason you use a lens hood is to stop stray light coming onto your lens which can create lens flare and give your images less contrast. This normally happens when shooting into the sun or when you have a strong light source in front of the lens. Let’s look at a couple of examples.
Taken without a lens hood. Gives a washed-out look and shows lens flare. The circles you see is the light reflecting off the glass elements within the lens.
Taken using the camera lens hood. Shows more contrast in the image and doesn’t have lens flare.
What does a lens hood do?
It quite simply blocks light from going over the front element of your lens. Below is a simple image of the same thing in the same place. One with a lens hood on the camera, and one without it. The image without the lens hood has caused light to go over the front of the lens and is giving the image less contrast and causing what’s called lens flare.
Examples showing camera lens hood on and off
The lens hood is creating a shadow over the front element of the lens thus blocking the light from hitting it.
Light shielded by camera lens hood
Light shining on the lens - Here the camera’s lens hood is not fully blocking the light. In this case, you are likely to get lens flare.
So that’s the main reason to use a lens hood – To shield the lens from unwanted light. This will give your pictures a stronger contrast of colours and tones and to stop lens flare.
When should you use a camera lens hood?
You should have a lens hood on all the time. Even when you’re inside or at night you could get stray light going over the front of your lens which will reduce the contrast of your image. Another bonus in using a lens hood is that it will protect the front of your lens. If you’re swinging your camera around and the front of it hits something, it’s your lens hood that will break first. Much cheaper to replace than a lens!
Another tip here is to always keep your lens clean as this will increase contrast and avoid lens flare too.
Exceptions to this rule
There are times when you might not want to use a lens hood. This is when you actually want to create lens flare or when you are using the pop-up flash on your camera. On some cameras, the light from the pop-up flash will be blocked by the lens hood and create a shadow in the bottom of your picture. This won’t happen if using a flashgun as the flash is higher on the camera and will miss the lens hood.
Creating lens flare on purpose can also give an awesome look to both portrait and landscape photography.
Sunset with rocks taken without a lens hood
Taken without a lens hood whilst shooting into the sun. Gives a washed-out look and shows lens flare. The circles you see is the light reflecting off the elements within the lens.
What types of camera lens hoods you can get?
It breaks down into two main types really. A petal-type lens hood and a cylindrical one.
Cylindrical Lens Hood and Petal-type Lens Hood
Petal lens hoods have the corners cut away. These types of hoods are used on your standard zoom lenses and lenses that go to wider angles. This is because if you didn’t have the corners cut out you would actually see the lens hood in the image at wide angles. You would see black in the corners of your picture, which isn’t a good look!
To put this to the test do this – zoom your lens out to its widest angle look through the viewfinder and move your hand forward adjacent to the lens and you’ll see the hand appear in the corners.
Then you have cylinder lens hoods, and these are perfect cylinders with nothing cut away. They are made for fixed focal range lenses (prime lenses) and telephoto lenses. They are shaped like this because prime lenses don’t zoom out, these lenses are fixed to a particular focal length so the hoods can be made to the exact point where it won’t be seen in the image. Telephoto lenses, lenses used for sports and wildlife photography, can also have cylinder lens hoods. This is because these lenses do not go to wide angles, therefore the lens hood will not be seen.
To learn more about lenses and focal lengths, click here.
Telephoto lens with lens hood
What lens hood do I get for my lens?
Is it a one size fits all scenario? The simple answer to that is no, one size doesn’t fit all. You have to get the lens hood for your particular lens. For instance, I have the canon 24-105 zoom and the 16-35 zoom lenses and they both need different lens hoods. The reason for this is the circumference of the front of the lenses are different, one is 77mm and the other is 82mm. The zoom range is also different meaning the cut-outs bits need to be different. The wider the angle of view the further back the cut outs need to be on a petal lens hood.
Now you do not need to get the branded lens hood for your lens but please avoid any lens hood that states they are universal. They will not work as well as one made specifically for your lens.
To find out what lens you have, simply look at the front of it and read off what it says. For instance, the image below shows the front of a canon lens and states ‘Canon zoom Lens EF 24-105mm’. This is the name of that lens. Simply type that followed by lens hood into a search bar and the lens hood for that lens will pop up. Easy as that!
To learn about camera equipment please click here.
To save you time we have compiled below the lens hoods needed for the most common beginner cameras. Please check the front of your lens to check the model of it before you buy the lens hood.
Canon EW-63C Lens Hood: Compatible with the Canon EF-S 18-55mm f3.5-5.6 IS STM - https://amzn.to/3seMRoS
Canon EW-83H Lens Hood for EF24-105mm f4.0L USM: Compatible with the Canon EF 24-105mm f4L IS II USM Lens - https://amzn.to/39m1T4P
Nikon HB-N106 Lens Hood: Compatible with Nikon 18-55mm AF-P VR - https://amzn.to/397eKHE
Check out our Recommended Beginners Photography Equipment here.
NB: These are paid links and TSoP will receive a small percentage of any purchases made.
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